[EBKatie]

Have you had to deal with 'mean girls' at your daughter's school or was your daughter the instigator? How did you handle it?

Read this brilliant article by Anna Spargo-Ryan, In the clique, for tips on how we can stop this kind of bullying before it becomes ingrained in our daughters.

[mudskippa]

That kind of bullying (exclusion) is ingrained in everyone. Nobody wants to hang out with people they don't like, end of. I don't actually know why anyone expects people or children to spend quality time with people they don't get along with. Tolerate and not be mean to, sure, but invite to your sleepover or every time you are doing something with your friends (i.e playing together in the playground) ... no.

It backfires too. My stepdaughter was in a clique and they weren't pleasant. The least pleasant of them all was often left out due to her unpleasantness, but her mother would bully the other mothers into including her in social things, which would then be ruined by her unpleasant behaviour and bullying. So they all had to put up with bullying to not be bullies themselves. Hmmmm.

Bullying is forcing others into things they don't want to do. To me it seems that forcing kids to include someone they do not like is itself bullying. There is no reason why any child HAS to play with another child when they are engaged in free play. To FORCE them to play together seems a much bigger instance of bullying than simply leaving a kid out and not bothering them.

This post has been edited by mudskippa: 25/07/2012, 12:19 PM

[~benita~]

one in every four schools is now affected by bullying, compared with 25 per cent just ten years ago.

This is a line from the article.

Seriously.

[Tesseract]

That kind of bullying (exclusion) is ingrained in everyone. Nobody wants to hang out with people they don't like, end of. I don't actually know why anyone expects people or children to spend quality time with people they don't get along with. Tolerate and not be mean to, sure, but invite your sleepover or every time you are doing something with your friends (i.e playing together in the playground) ... no.

Written by somebody who has obviously never been on the receiving end of a sustained and systemic campaign of bullying and ostracising.

[prettypenny]

one in every four schools is now affected by bullying, compared with 25 per cent just ten years ago.

This is a line from the article.

Seriously.

And in the future a quarter of schools will be affected.

[purplekitty]

one in every four schools is now affected by bullying, compared with 25 per cent just ten years ago.

This is a line from the article.

Seriously.

I saw that. Rightly or wrongly, I didn't have the inclination to read the rest of the article.

[mudskippa]

Written by somebody who has obviously never been on the receiving end of a sustained and systemic campaign of bullying and ostracising.

LOL. I bet you are totally anti-bullying. Not.

[beakie]

I agree it's about teaching tolerance and acceptance for all children, and teaching children empathy. Some kids seem unable to put themselves in the shoes of another child, to imagine what it feels like to be excluded etc. I agree that children don't have to be best friends with every child, but learning to include other people, and be generally respectful of the feelings of others is key, IMO.A lot of this seems to stem from parents. I would never allow my children to have a party with all but a handful of their class mates for example. Have 1 or 2 good friends ( which is what we do), or include everyone. Similarly, if you generally play in a group of 4, all 4 should be included, not just the flavor of the day. Sometimes kids need help to see what is fair, but quite often parents aren't prepared to help with this which is unfortunate.

[BetteBoop]

That kind of bullying (exclusion) is ingrained in everyone. Nobody wants to hang out with people they don't like, end of. I don't actually know why anyone expects people or children to spend quality time with people they don't get along with. Tolerate and not be mean to, sure, but invite to your sleepover or every time you are doing something with your friends (i.e playing together in the playground) ... no.

Bullying is forcing others into things they don't want to do. To me it seems that forcing kids to include someone they do not like is itself bullying. There is no reason why any child HAS to play with another child when they are engaged in free play. To FORCE them to play together seems a much bigger instance of bullying than simply leaving a kid out and not bothering them.

What the?

Not wanting to play with someone because you prefer someone else's company is not what exclusion is. Where did you get the notion that schools are forcing kids to play with everyone, regardless of their friendship group?

Exclusion is the deliberate, systematic rejection of one child to hurt that child. Schools preventing kids from doing that are not bullying children, they are showing a commitment to behaviour management.

And no, not every child does this. I would be very disappointed if I found out my child was deliberately hurting another child, regardless of what method was used to inflict the pain.

[TherophosaBlondi]

Written by somebody who has obviously never been on the receiving end of a sustained and systemic campaign of bullying and ostracising.

I have been and can see what Mudskippa is saying.

Why do we force kids into playing with people they don't like? It's not bullying to not want to do this. Be polite at all times but you don't have to include everyone all of the time.